The Fire When She Saw Past my Mask
by Arrow.Light.Smoke
Summary: Uchiha Itachi knew three things: 1. She hated Itachi 2. Sasuke needed her for his plans 3. She would never let Itachi leave Konoha. But he needed to leave, he needed to die. Nevertheless, Itachi found himself less and less convinced that she hated him, that Sasuke needed her, that he even wanted to leave. No, perhaps Itachi himself needed her healing power. ItaSaku
1. Chapter 1

I was away on a mission when it happened. Sai, Kakashi, Naruto, and I were investigating some strong rumors we had heard about someone with "red eyes" and "demonic companions" laying waste to half of a remote village in Whirlpool country. One of Tsunade-shishou's undercover shinobi in Whirlpool country had been en route to rendezvous with an ANBU member to give his bi-weekly report when he noticed that his favorite cherry blossom tree statue was missing a limb. The shinobi, at first thinking that his cover had been compromised, had prepared for imminent attack and, with his subsequent scan of the area, realized that the village to which the statue belonged was... off. At first he couldn't place it, and he knew that anyone who hadn't walked by here once every two weeks for three years wouldn't have noticed. In fact, he was only able to notice because of the tree statue and the foggiest trace of a chakra signature along the edge of the village. Once he was aware of the disturbance in the village, he investigated further and found that it bore all of the signs of having been subjected to search, and he included this event in his report. Naturally, when Tsunade-shishou received this news, she sent us along to investigate further, as those who both knew Sasuke the most and also could handle him with the least casualties.

When we talked with them, the locals all claimed to have seen four demons streak through their quaint land (the reported number actually varied from four demons to twelve demons, but the person who said twelve was known by his friends to exaggerate). These demons were fervently searching for something, although none of the villagers could recall what that something was. It was rather odd, really, because each villager we interviewed had seemed certain that the "demons" questioned them about the object, but they couldn't recall any of the words used to question them. I analyzed their brains for any chakra-based irregularities, but no one seemed to have tampered with their memories. I didn't think that anyone on Sasuke's team had the ability to alter memories anyway. Try as we might, we couldn't find a single explanation for what the team had been looking for, as none of the villagers were able to report anything missing.

At that point, it seemed that Sasuke's team had not found what they were looking for and Kakashi had taken my suggestion to continue into the next town over and wait because Sasuke was likely to search the area again. I believed that we were investigating a site that Sasuke had no way of expecting us to find since there were no obvious changes visible to an outsider. Under that assumption, this village was our best bet of ambushing Sasuke's team to be able to subdue them and bring Sasuke home.

However, my surreptitious plan was not to be. We took shelter in an abandoned building within the small village and began writing our updated plan on our communication scroll (linked to an identical scroll in Tsunade-shishou's office) only to be interrupted by Tsunade-shishou frantically scribbling back a message. Uchiha Itachi and Hoshigake Kisame had been spotted along the Konoha border by two ANBU scouts. That part of the message was oddly not the most worrisome, although Kakashi's face went stern, I gasped audibly, and Naruto started yelling about how he would get revenge on those Akatsuki bastards. No, the worrisome part was that Shishou herself chose to confront them with only her ANBU guard. The pain slowly and coldly slicing through my heart as I waited for her to finish writing what happened was almost surreal.

Now, Shishou, Shizune-senpai and I had been working on a particular poison for use in capturing Sasuke, poison that was in fact sitting in my thigh pouch at that very moment. We took the poison favored by Sasori and distilled it, then used its chemical composition to create a new, weaker poison with a specific goal: incapacitating the target's eyes. The idea was that as long as we could just _graze_ Sasuke with this poison, it would shut down his Sharingan in a matter of minutes, and the shock to his system would render him unconscious. As far as capture-without-death went, the poison was ideal: the only challenge was to stay alive until the poison's effect could take place.

Since Tsunade-shishou was writing to us from her scroll (for only her chakra could activate her scroll), we knew that she was conscious and well enough to write to us, so the crushing fear pulsing through every inch of my body as I waited for more characters to appear was possibly unwarranted. Nevertheless, I didn't breathe out until she finished her next message, which started with " _I'm surprisingly fine_ " and ended with " _Kisame got away and killed two of my guard_." That revelation stung me because I was familiar with all of the ANBU in Shishou's guard, and Kisame must have had a scary amount of strength to take out one of them, let alone two, while they were protecting her.

Her next entry was so surprising I honestly read it five times to make sure I wasn't under a genjutsu. " _Daichi died giving me my opportunity to slice Itachi with the poison; Kisame was swinging his sword behind Itachi to protect him from my kunai while Daichi was assaulting Itachi from the front, and at the last second, Daichi switched places with me, allowing me to slice Itachi's arm. Uchiha Itachi is in our custody._ "

Kakashi was the first of us to formulate a coherent response, and scribbled back a question about why we would want the Uchiha in custody, since surely the other Akatsuki members would return for him and would also seek out Naruto while they were at it.

" _While we were fighting, Kisame mentioned something about infiltrating Konoha. I don't think he would have said that if he knew I would survive, but we need to know what plans the Akatsuki already have in place, and Itachi is our best chance to get that information._ "

Naruto was extremely tense when he read that message. I think he knew that he was the reason the Akatsuki would risk confronting an entire village, and it was against his ninja way to allow any danger to come to his loved ones.

" _I need all of you to report back immediately for debriefing. Sakura, I need you in particular. We designed this poison for Sasuke, whose eyes were not as damaged as Itachi's are, and the poison does not appear to have acted the way we expected it to. I could use your delicacy and creativity in repairing some of the damage._ "

Kakashi sent a short reply of assent to Tsunade-shishou while I felt my face get a little warm at the small compliment. It wasn't that she never complimented me, just that I wasn't used to her saying such an obvious compliment in front of others.

"The hokage thinks that you're delicate, I guess you're more feminine than I thought, Ugl—" Sai began, only to be stopped by my fist connecting with his jaw.

"Sakura! You'll need that chakra for our run back to Konoha; we're not going to stop mid-way this time," Kakashi chided with a crinkle in his eye.

I just let out a "hmph" and bounded out the window of the abandoned building, showing that I had plenty of chakra left for the journey home.

"Ne, Sakura-chan, want to race back?" Naruto yelled after me, frowning slightly. He still seemed upset that the Akatsuki had some sort of plans to undermine Konoha, presumably just to get to him.

So before I could really think better of it, I yelled "Shannaro!" and poured on the speed. I was rewarded with Naruto's toothy grin, and some of the anxiety I had been feeling settled. Maybe Naruto could get through this, maybe he could learn to lean on the village and let us protect him for once. Something inside me was so scared that he would run off, just like Sasuke, but for a very different, less selfish reason. I quickly shook that thought away: Naruto was not the type to run away, he always ran headfirst into a problem, much like the race we were currently participating in. I looked back briefly to see Kakashi shaking his head, seemingly defeated, but when his eyes met mine, he gave me a single, small nod. He had seen it too, the lack of light in Naruto's eyes, and he knew that distracting Naruto was the best option for now.

Shooting chakra down my legs to fuel my run didn't require much concentration, so I couldn't stop thinking of all the implications for this situation. Would Sasuke find out that Itachi was being held by Konoha and return to kill him? Would the Akatsuki attack just to retrieve Itachi, or would they leave him to rot? What did the damage to Itachi's eyes look like? Maybe examining Itachi's eyes would help me fine-tune the poison to be sure that the damage done to Sasuke's eyes would be reversible when we used the poison on him. Sasuke deserved to be able to see because he was my friend and he was part of Team 7 and he was the first boy I loved and… he left me unconscious on a bench at night and tried to kill me and… Not going down that train of thought because I still don't know where it ends.

But that was all Itachi's fault anyway. Uchiha Itachi, the man who ruined Sasuke's life and made him so hungry for revenge. That was the man who awaited me in Konoha, the same man who taunted Sasuke into his lust for power and subsequent defection from Konoha. The man whose fault it was that Sasuke might soon be added to Konoha's bingo book with 1,000,000 ryo on his head. Yes, I would focus my emotions on Itachi, someone who was an unequivocal symbol of evil: traitorous, mocking, and unrelenting. It was _his_ fault that Sasuke left, and now I had the chance to make sure he felt every ounce of pain that Sasuke's defection had caused me.

Before I had fully managed to pull myself out of my thoughts, I was standing in front of the Konoha gates. I looked around and saw that, oddly enough, I beat Naruto. And so did Sai. And Kakashi. I guess the shortcut he had yelled to me about wasn't actually shorter after all.

Fifteen minutes went by and I actually started to get worried, that is until the guard at the gate smiled at me extra big and transformed into a very curvaceous naked woman.

"Naruto, will you ever grow up?!" I yelled in exasperation, punching away his jutsu. I was actually impressed that he had finally learned how to successfully hide his chakra while performing a henge, but there was **no** way I was going to tell him that now.

He had the grace to look sheepish and scratch the back of his head.

"He can't grow up because he doesn't have a d—" Sai provided, only to be cut off by the _poof_ of Kakashi's transportation jutsu.

We all appeared just outside of Tsunade-shishou's office, which made it rather unfortunate when Naruto screamed, "I'm going to kill you, you emotionless Picasso-wannabe!"

Tsunade-shishou just cleared her throat, glaring through the open door.

"I haven't had enough sake yet to deal with this," she muttered to herself, but unless you knew her well, you wouldn't have been able to distinguish the words. Shizune-senpai, who was next to Shishou, shot her a withering look over Ton-ton that said "you're a medic and you should know how bad drinking on the job is."

"Hello, Shishou," I offered, bowing slightly to diffuse the tension.

"Hello, Sakura," Tsunade replied, then fixed her gaze on Kakashi. "Kakashi, please debrief me about your mission," Tsunade-shishou commanded in full hokage-mode. When Kakashi was done, she sent all of us home to rest because we had been running back to Konoha for the entirety of the day.

"But Tsunade-baa-chan, I don't need any sleep! I want to know why you're letting that _bastard_ live in—" Naruto burst, but his final words were muffled by the overwhelmingly loud grumbles of his stomach. "Well, maybe after some ramen," he conceded.

We all turned to leave, but I turned back when Shishou continued, "Sakura, I want you to report to the prison at 0900 to begin examining the effects of the poison."

"Hai, Shishou!"

Tsunade-shishou nodded and I turned again to leave, giving Ton-ton an affectionate pat on the head as I walked past. My legs were tired from having to channel so much chakra all day during the run back to Fire Country, so I decided to teleport home and formed the appropriate hand signs.

If I had realized how exhausted I already was, I would have walked instead because the fatigue hit me all at once, like being knocked down by a severe wind shear. I was so tired that I took off my outer layer of clothes and crawled into bed, promising to brush my teeth twice in the morning to make up for not doing so that night. It's not like I had anyone to impress anyway.

 _Tomorrow is going to be such a long day. I just hope that something good will come of this._ was all I managed to think before sleep pulled me into its silky rapture.


	2. Chapter 2

_A/N: Before the time period of this fanfic, Pain's attack on Konoha happened, but Sakura and Shizune were able to bring her out of the coma, so Danzo was never hokage as per this fanfic._

Itachi opened his eyes as he heard the creak of the iron door and breathed the draft of slightly less stale air. Or rather, he thought that he opened his eyes. The last thing he remembered was seeing the hokage smirk at him and wondering if she had been able to create a poison capable of affecting him. It certainly seemed that way, since here he was, lying on stone, unable to see anything. Whatever poison it was had knocked him unconscious, but he was puzzled by his lack of sight. Perhaps his holding cell was merely extremely dark and his blurred vision was diffusing the light so broadly that the area appeared lightless.

Using the Sharingan would help. He tried to activate his Sharingan and sorely regretted the decision when instead of black, he now saw a field of fuzzy brown lines and felt the fire of a thousand liters of hydrochloric acid surging through his eyes.

This was a rather unfortunate moment for someone to greet him.

"Uchiha-san," the businesslike, feminine voice began, "good; you're awake this time. Sit up."

Itachi said nothing for fear of letting his inner scream of pain escape. He inclined his head but an inch, as if preparing to sit up as instructed, then froze because the pain increased tenfold. To his horror, a slight grunt managed to rumble from his throat, betraying his excruciating level of discomfort.

However, his visitor seemed to think he was purposefully ignoring his request.

"Ugh, you are so much like your brother, Itachi-san, grunting at everyone and not moving a centimeter unless it suits you," his visitor growled as he felt small hands grab his bare forearms and force him upright.

This time Itachi could barely hold in his urge to yell out his pain and he began to shiver with the effort of staying quiet. Sweat quickly collected on his forehead and began to form a droplet that lid down his nose.

"Huh? Are you cold? But you're sweating," the voice contemplated, her voice switching swiftly from callous to concerned.

Itachi felt the same small, slightly cool hands settle on both of his temples. His shivering settled the moment foreign chakra began to flow into his head, as if his body could sense the healing intent behind the gesture.

"You must be in unimaginable pain right now, why didn't you say something?" the voice asked as the foreign chakra poured deeper into his own chakra channels. The prickling acidic aflame feeling in his eyes subsided steadily into the dull ache he was used to. Only then did he dare to move enough to speak.

"The slight inclination of my head made the pain worsen. Talking would have compounded that," Itachi stated simply, then frowned. "You know my name, but I lack the reciprocal knowledge. May I ask your name?"

"Haruno Sakura," the voice replied. Itachi wasn't entirely surprised by this information; he knew that Sakura was a medic of greater talent than the hokage. Most would put her at equal or lesser talent, but Itachi had spent a lot of time observing Sasuke's teammates and had seen in both strength and ingenuity superior to that of their Sannin masters. He knew that the hokage would never let her apprentice be the one to examine him if the hokage's own prowess would have been enough.

"Haruno-san, thank you," Itachi offered genuinely.

There was a brief pause before Sakura replied.

"I wouldn't be so quick to say that if I were you. I'm not here to finish healing you, I am merely here to examine your eyes and determine what the effect of our poison was," Sakura snapped, seemingly annoyed to have received his thanks.

Itachi carefully tested each limb as he thought over this information. They had developed a poison that could target the Sharingan; he was more than impressed. The shackles around his wrists sounded with a _ting_ as he clacked them together. They were inhibiting his chakra flow, no doubt. Sakura was more of the trusting and sympathetic sort from what he had seen, so he thought she would be a bit less hostile toward him. Even so, she had responded to his extreme pain with sympathy, healing his eyes to a manageable level. He couldn't help but resonate with her distaste for undue suffering.

Sakura interrupted his musings with a barrage of questions.

"What do you see? Does it still hurt when you move? Does it hurt when I poke your eye? What was your eyesight like before the poison?"

Itachi didn't answer immediately, and not only because she had asked an absurd amount of questions at once. He was trying to decide whether or not to be forthcoming with this information; after all, she was essentially using him as a test subject and was not intending to heal him. What incentive did he have for answering her questions?

To his intense chagrin, he began to violently cough and he experienced the familiar sensation of spewing blood alongside the 100 mile-per-hour air shooting out violently from his lungs. Itachi was slightly panicked, knowing that his medicine had been in his cloak and they had taken his cloak from him.

Sakura's hand quickly moved to his back. "This makes no sense at all; the poison was only supposed to target your eyes. I guess the shock to your system was a lot greater than I anticipated."

Itachi didn't bother to correct her. If she thought his lung disease was caused by her poison, maybe she wouldn't use the poison on Sasuke. He needed Sasuke to keep his ability to use the Sharingan. Sasuke still needed to take his revenge and Itachi still needed the peace only the sight of his parents in the afterlife could bring him.

However, he mused, if Sasuke was poisoned, they would bring Sasuke to Konoha and he would be safe from Madara. Itachi was worried that with his capture, Madara would seek to fill his position in Akatsuki with Sasuke, especially now that he was planning a second infiltration of Konoha. Pain had attacked only a month ago and the village had still not fully recovered, so Madara would strike soon. He needed to recruit more manpower quickly since he had lost Kakuzu, Hidan, Sasori, Deidara, Pain, and Konan all in a very short period of time.

Itachi could think of only one way that Madara would succeed in recruiting Sasuke to Akatsuki, and Itachi would kill Madara for it. He hadn't been able to prepare for that possibility, mostly because he shouldn't have been able to be captured. Orochimaru had inoculated all of Akatsuki to all known poisons, so Itachi had never had to worry about the glimmer of liquid on a blade before.

"Uchiha-san, did you have this lung condition before Tsunade-sama poisoned you?" Sakura pressed, her medical chakra not having been able to determine the answer. Either the poison had done a lot of horrific damage _fast_ (which poisons were wont to do), or Itachi had previously contracted this disease.

"I have had this lung disease for years," Itachi clarified before another bout of coughing took over. He decided that it was more important for Sasuke to be free of Madara's influence than it was for him to be able to keep his Sharingan.

"Oh," Sakura breathed, sounding almost frightened and removing her hand from Itachi's back as if scalded.

"Oh?"

"Nothing, nothing. Does it still hurt when you move?"

Itachi merely shook his head, annoyed at her blatant subject change.

"What about when I poke your eye?"

"No more than it hurts when anyone pokes someone else's eye."

"What do you see?"

"Blackness."

"And your eyesight before the poison?"

This was the part that Itachi was most reluctant to reveal. Sakura had already seen the weakness of his lungs, likely brought on because he hadn't taken his medicine in so long, due to being unconscious and all. He didn't want to give the additional information that his eyesight had been leaving him slowly. If Konoha knew how weak he was at just this moment, they might kill him and ruin the future he had worked so long to construct for Sasuke. However, Konoha would make a powerful enemy out of Uchiha Sasuke if they killed him.

"Blurry."

"All right. As much as I enjoy spending time with the mass murderer who drove the love of my life to defect from the village and train with the least moral ex-Konoha shinobi, I need to research a few things that I saw and make some notes."

Sakura had been addressing him civilly again until that point, so Itachi was again surprised to be on the receiving end of her hostility. However, Itachi had gained some valuable information. First, Sasuke was at some point the love of her life, if not currently. Second, Itachi was not the least moral ex-Konoha shinobi. For some reason, this both pleased and plagued him. He found himself wondering what Sakura would think if she knew the true circumstances of that fateful night, that he had been fully sane and had still chosen to follow orders. As usual, he buried those thoughts and instead focused on the sound of Sakura's retreating footsteps and the sharp whine of the iron door as it again opened and shut.

She was his key to escaping this holding cell, he just had to figure out how to convince her that he wasn't a threat.

* * *

As I left Itachi's holding area, I nodded to the two guards on duty and told them to bring Itachi some food that he would be able to eat with his eyes closed. One of the guards gave me an odd look, but they both nodded. I trudged down the hallway and up the stairs to the building entrance.

It felt wrong, how the low sun greeted me with its warm gaze and a small rabbit blinked hopped innocently across the path. I had just spoken with one of the most treacherous criminals to hail from Konoha. I had just spoken with a man who killed his own flesh and blood. I had just spoken with **Uchiha Itachi**. And I felt compassion for him. Twice. Once when he was visibly shaking with pain; no one deserved that kind of torture. Once again when I was examining his lungs.

As I began the short walk to the hokage tower, my mind drifted to the events that happened in Itachi's cell, trying to sort out what I would report to Tsunade-shishou.

Something was off about his lung disease. It was severe and certainly shocking, but I couldn't place what was so different about it until Itachi had mentioned having it for years. I had only seen anything like it once before, in an elderly man whose grandson finally dragged him into the hospital years after he should have gone. The man hadn't been able to move his arm for two years, although he said the mobility had been leaving him for about ten years. I had examined it and could not find any medical cause for the issue. Usually a neural issue was to blame, but all of the man's nerves were functional. I was about to call Tsunade-shishou to examine him when his grandson explained it without even knowing what he was doing. Ten years before, he had lost his wife of fifty years.

Somatization was surprisingly uncommon in the shinobi world. Shinobi had their vices and they used them to deal with their emotions. Asuma-sensei had his cigarettes, Kakashi had his adult novels, Tsunade-shishou had her sake. But that elderly man hadn't dealt with his grief and it had manifested physically in his body.

Uchiha Itachi's lungs were not a factor of any physical disease, which would explain why I hadn't been able to determine a cause and also why Itachi seemed not to have been able to find a way to heal them. His lungs had the same mysterious pulse that the elderly man's arm had exhibited.

I didn't know how to process this information— what grief could a psychopathic killer feel? How could he have enough grief to mortally damage his lungs? Did he regret his actions? It was this very same chain of thoughts that had bulleted through my mind as I examined Itachi. I didn't know how to feel about the revelation, so my brain had gone on auto-pilot and I jumped into medic-mode with him while I mulled over the information.

After thinking about it, I was angry. How could I feel sorry for the grief that a mass-murderer went through? The reality was that I _did_ feel sorry for the grief that he went through and that made me so mad. Even if whatever caused him to grieve also caused him to murder, I shouldn't be able forgive him of his transgressions against Konoha and against Sasuke. And I didn't forgive him for all of that, but I did feel less animosity.

I was budding with rage at my own sympathetic emotions when I arrived at Shishou's office.

"Come in, Sakura," Tsunade-shishou said, ushering me inside. She noticed the confusion and frustration on my face. "What happened with the Uchiha?"

"He was completely blinded by the poison and was in such extreme pain that the slightest movement burdened him." I hesitated.

"Go on, I can see that you have more to say," Tsunade-shishou prodded.

"It's just that he has some severe lung damage, not from the poison. He'll need to be healed before anyone can interrogate him about Akatsuki's infiltration plans. Otherwise, I estimate he has less than a week to live and he certainly won't hold up if he's subjected to any strong jutsu."

"I see." Shishou seemed to consider the implications of my words carefully. "Since you're concerned for his wellbeing, you can begin to heal him tomorrow. No more than what is necessary for him to hold up under interrogation."

"But Tsunade-shi—"

"No buts, Sakura. We desperately need this information or Konoha will again become a crater devoid of life, as Pain tried to leave it. Only ten people know that Uchiha Itachi even came within range of the village. And two of them are dead."

That meant that Tsunade-shishou hadn't even told the elders of Itachi's presence. Shishou was suspicious of the motives of some of the elders and she was even more suspicious of Danzo. I had seen for myself at a couple of meetings the strange way the man talked about protecting the village. His thoughts always went to the extreme first, especially where Sasuke was concerned. Danzo wanted him dead, and didn't relent in pushing his opinion even when he was out-voted. If I were Tsunade-shishou, I wouldn't have told anyone else about Itachi's presence either.

"Sakura, I can't be the one to heal him. The elders will see my exhaustion at the meeting and know that something is up. Shizune also attends the daily meetings, but she also doesn't have your inventiveness. I know how you feel about Uchiha Itachi; to you he's the root of everything that went wrong in your life,"

I had been glowering at the floor, but my head shot up when she said that. Was it really so easy to tell that I blamed Itachi for Sasuke's actions?

Shishou saw my reaction and continued, "Naruto said as much when he visited today to yell at me again about my decision. I just figured you would feel the same. I need this information. Konoha needs this information. Naruto needs this information."

Her last sentence hit it home. We needed this intelligence if we were going to convince Naruto to let us protect him. He was half a breath away from running off to face the Akatsuki alone, and as powerful as he was, he wouldn't survive that battle.

"Hai. I will report to his holding cell again tomorrow morning." It wouldn't be easy to heal, so I would have to stock up on carbs and vitamins tonight to increase my endurance.

"Thank you, you're dismissed."

I left the hokage tower feeling slightly defeated and headed to Ichiraku, where I knew I would be able to find Naruto. The low sun had finished its descent behind Hokage mountain and it was officially evening, which meant that the 2 bowls for 10 ryo deal was happening. I needed the carbs, so I ducked into the small establishment and sat next to the puff of blond hair that was Naruto.

"Sabira-chaaa!" exclaimed Naruto with a full mouth when he saw me.

I shook my head at him for talking with his mouth full— really, no one else would be able to understand that blabber— but fluffed his hair affectionately.

"Uglyyyy, I'm glad you could join us," Sai greeted.

I felt a small smile spread across my lips. After such a frustrating day with the S-rank destroyer of Team Seven, I was craving normalcy.

Sai returned my smile with one of his own, and for once it didn't seem quite so fake. He pulled his near-empty ramen bowl up to his mouth and drank the remnants. After setting the bowl down, one of his hands rested very close to mine, but it was a cramped restaurant and I thought nothing of it. Until he started talking again.

"Your smile makes me feel like everything will be okay. I will always fight for the chance to see your ugly smile," Sai leaned toward me, his dilated pupils staring intently into mine, waiting for a response.

"WHO GAVE SAKE TO SAI AND LET HIM WATCH MORE ROMANCE MOVIES?" I bellowed, and Naruto was smart enough to create some clones before he started running so I would have more targets for my wrath.

There was an entire week this month when Sai would only talk in quotes from a romance movie; Naruto appeared to have re-created that incident. Sai said a lot of very sweet things that week, the problem was that he said them to every girl he came across. I don't think I ever saw a man get slapped more times than Sai in that week. I finally managed to explain to him after a week why he was coming across so poorly. I just hated the memory because even through that phase, Sai still only called me Ugly. Was my face _really_ that hideous?

I pushed Sai back to give myself some breathing room and ordered some ramen. Naruto wouldn't be back for a while and I couldn't waste my chakra by beating him into the ground, no matter how much I wanted to.

 _Well, at least Naruto seems like his old self today_. _Now, how will I get my revenge…_


End file.
